Launch success: Atlas V delivers GPS satellite to orbit
CAPE CANAVERAL – The U.S. military's next Global Positioning System satellite is safely in orbit after an 11:36 a.m. blastoff atop an Atlas V rocket.
The 19-story United Launch Alliance rocket thundered into a partly cloudy sky above Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, lifting off from Launch Complex 41 with 860,000 pounds of thrust.
Nearly three-and-a-half hours later, ULA confirmed that the rocket's Centaur upper stage had deployed the satellite named GPS IIF-10 in space as planned.
The Boeing-built spacecraft is the 10th in a series of a dozen known as Block IIF, and the second of three GPS missions to launch this year.
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The satellite will fly more than 12,000 miles up, joining a constellation with 31 active members orbiting in six planes. A 19-year-old satellite will be taken out of service.
The launch came as the Air Force celebrates the 20th anniversary of the GPS constellation becoming a fully global service providing highly accurate mapping, navigation and pinpoint timing services for military and civilian use.
And Atlas V flew successfully for a 55th time just over two weeks after the Cape's last launch ended in failure, when a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying International Space Station supplies broke apart more than two minutes after a June 28 launch.
ULA plans to follow the GPS mission with another launch in a week, this time by a Delta IV rocket carrying a military communications satellite.
Check back here for updates on the conclusion of today's launch.
Contact Dean at 321-242-3668 or jdean@floridatoday.com. Follow him on Twitter at @flatoday_jdean and on Facebook at facebook.com/jamesdeanspace